FREED FROM THE ACTION OF GRAVITY. a7 
tinue to pour; but as soon as we cease to pour out and the 
movement of translation is slackened, the train of oil is instantly 
resolved into several isolated spherules. 
21. The formation of a ring analogous to that of Saturn 
naturally inspires the desire to carry further the resemblance to 
the system of that planet, and to seek whether, by some modi- 
fication of our experiment, it would not be possible to contrive 
so that a sphere of oil should remain in the middle of the ring. 
Now, I have succeeded in producing this effect, by means of a 
process which I shall proceed to describe; only that this expe- 
riment must be regarded merely as a scientific sport, for the 
circumstances which give rise to the result have evidently no 
analogy with those which can have occasioned the configuration 
of the system of Saturn. 
It is first necessary to be able to give to the disc a consider- 
able velocity of rotation. To do this, we adapt to the upper part 
of the vessel a system of two pulleys, one small, and fixt on to 
the prolongation of the axis of the disc at the place of the handle, 
which is taken away ; the other larger, and to the axis of which 
the same handle is attached. In my apparatus the diameters of 
the two pulleys are respectively 12 and 75 millimetres. In the 
second place, the diameter of the sphere being always nearly 
6 centimetres, that of the disc should be only 2 centimetres. 
Lastly, the disc should not have, as in the preceding experi- 
ments, its centre coinciding with that of the sphere, it should 
be placed lower, toward the inferior part of the latter. 
Matters being thus arranged, the handle is turned with a ve- 
locity which experience soon enables us to find: in my apparatus 
this velocity ought to be about two turns and a half per second, 
which nearly corresponds to fifteen turns of the disc in the same 
time. We then see, in general, a ring rapidly formed, which 
extends itself, leaving in its centre a mass of oil, to which it re- 
mains united by a thin pellicle. At the instant when the ring 
has attamed a sufficient development (and by habit alone can 
_ this be correctly learnt), the rotation is suddenly stopt. The 
+0 ay 
: pellicle then breaks, the ring remains completely isolated, and 
the central mass forms into a sphere. We have thus, during 
_ Some instants, a curious representation of the system of Saturn, 
except the flattening of the ring. The ring returns rapidly after- 
wards upon itself, and is again united to the central sphere. 
